sail.
A piece of fabric attached to a boat and arranged such that it causes the wind to drive the boat along. The sail may be attached to the boat via a combination of mast, spars and ropes.
Meaning & usage
A piece of fabric attached to a boat and arranged such that it causes the wind to drive the boat along. The sail may be attached to the boat via a combination of mast, spars and ropes.
The concept of a sail or sails, as if a substance.
Take in sail: a storm is coming.
The power harnessed by a sail or sails, or the use of this power for travel or transport.
A trip in a boat, especially a sailboat.
Let's go for a sail.
A sailing vessel; a vessel of any kind; a craft.
Twenty sail were in sight.
The conning tower of a submarine.
The blade of a windmill.
A tower-like structure found on the dorsal (topside) surface of submarines.
The floating organ of siphonophores, such as the Portuguese man-of-war.
A sailfish.
We caught three sails today.
an outward projection of the spine, occurring in certain dinosaurs and synapsids
Anything resembling a sail, such as a wing.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English saile, sayle, seil, seyl, from Old English seġl, from Proto-West Germanic *segl, from Proto-Germanic *seglą. Cognate with West Frisian seil, Low German Segel, Dutch zeil, German Segel, Danish sejl, Swedish segel.
To be impelled or driven forward by the action of wind upon sails, as a ship on water; to be impelled on a body of water by steam or other power.
To move through or on the water; to swim, as a fish or a waterfowl.
To ride in a boat, especially a sailboat.
To set sail; to begin a voyage.
We sail for Australia tomorrow.
To move briskly and gracefully through the air.
To move briskly but sedately.
The duchess sailed haughtily out of the room.
To deal out (cards) from a distance by impelling them across a surface.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English sailen, saylen, seilen, seilien, from Old English seġlan, siġlan (“to sail”), from Proto-West Germanic *siglijan, from *siglijaną. Cognate with West Frisian sile, Low German seilen, Dutch zeilen, German segeln, Danish sejle, Swedish segla, Icelandic sigla.
Try it on your idea.
sail has 4 characters. Say it out loud, try it alongside a description of your project, and see whether its meaning fits what you want to create.
These are naming prompts. Meanings and pronunciation can vary; existing brand and domain uses have not been checked.
Explore the name generatorA word with a source.
Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.